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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think this is a bit cheeky (EBay related second chance)

20 replies

OrlandoWoolf · 14/01/2014 23:47

I have had a second offer on something on EBay. Apparently the winner accidentally bid and just beat my maximum bid.

If the person had not bid, my winning bid would have been £10 less than the winning bid. The person has offered me the item at my maximum bid.

I have emailed to say I would pay them the bid I was winning at before this person "accidentally outbid me".

OP posts:
aquashiv · 15/01/2014 00:05

Sounds fine to me but it depends on what it is and what it is worth to you. When will they let you know you need to have a back up plan?

jacks365 · 15/01/2014 00:17

They've tried it on to increase the price. It's quite a common scam.

Tryharder · 15/01/2014 00:21

DO NOT under any circumstances buy this item. On the sheer principle of it. Even if you have to go to an actual shop and buy it new for double the price. Cheeky fuckers.

whereisshe · 15/01/2014 00:25

It's quite likely to be shill bidding. Out of interest did the previously winning bidder have 100% of their bids with the same seller?

And I wouldn't pay for it if I were you, I'd probably report them for fraudulent bidding practices.

Original poster
OrlandoWoolf · 15/01/2014 07:30

Interesting. Don't think it's bidding with this one person as they've only had 1 bid with them out of 7 (in the last month)

OP posts:
Original poster
OrlandoWoolf · 15/01/2014 07:31

I did not think you could withdraw bids if you "made a mistake".

OP posts:
ZillionChocolate · 15/01/2014 07:32

Maybe message them and say I'm willing to pay x. See what they say.

MomsStiffler · 15/01/2014 08:15

They can contact the seller & ask for their bid to be withdrawn.

It depends how cheaply you're getting it for, you were willing to pay your maximum bid price, but I'd be annoyed if I thought someone had knocked the price up.

I'd refuse their offer & then bid on it again when they re-list if it suited me if they won't accommodate your offer....

MomsStiffler · 15/01/2014 08:16

Missing some punctuation in that last sentence!! Blush

AntlersInAllOfMyDecorating · 15/01/2014 08:37

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whois · 15/01/2014 08:40

It's a scam - shill bidding.

NinjaBunny · 15/01/2014 09:23

Shill bidding.

Do not buy.

Prettykitty111 · 15/01/2014 09:28

It not a scam I've been on eBay 15 years and never seen any shill bidding. If you believe it to be shill bidding then report the seller to eBay and they will investigate and if necessary remove the seller. bidders can't remove bids in the final hours of an auction so they may have emailed the seller and they haven't read the message in time, again this has happened to me before. I've done second chance offers before now when a first buyer has not paid and if the second buyer wants to enter into a negotiation then that is fine with me but at the end of the day I can say no. It depends how much you want the item and if the seller has a history of relishing unsold items. If that's the case maybe say no let them relist and bid again.
Also there is a whole eBay section on mumsnet where you should really have listed this. There are some real eBay experts over there who would have been able to explain how you can report shill bidding etc.

Original poster
OrlandoWoolf · 15/01/2014 09:38

I emailed them to see if they would take the bid I was winning at. It's £10 less than the bid that "won".

I don't think it's shill bidding. It was a last second bid so I am surprised it was allowed to be retracted.

OP posts:
TeacupDrama · 15/01/2014 10:14

you can retract a bid yourself anytime up until auction finishes it maybe shill bidding but it could be a mistake easy to do type in 90 instead of 80

it must have been expensive if bidding was going up in £10 increments

however if you were winning at £25 and your max was £34 and they put in a max of £40 they would win at £35 ( as at that price the increment is £1), however when seller looks at bidding history it will have your last bid as £34 and them at £35.

hence he is offering it to you at what your final bid was; this is how second chance works it is offered to second bidder at their last bed which in the above scenario is £34 not the £25 you saw it at 10 minutes before auction ended

however you can get back and say if he had retracted his bid or not bid at all rather than cancelled after auction I would have won at £25 you can check bid history just to make sure there was not a third bidder at £29 etc the names will be in code like a**6 but you can see if the same person made several bids automatically by looking at time of bid placement is they have 10 bids all placed 10/01/14 at 20.29 then it is automatically upping if every bid has a different time they are manually slowly upping their bids

jacks365 · 15/01/2014 10:22

You can't withdraw bids as such but nor can the sale really be enforced. I came a cropper to that when I won a bundle of baby items but the seller refused to honour the sale as it wasn't as much as she wanted.

You can often tell on ebay when someone has put a higher maximum and sometimes people do get friends to put a bid on to push it up.

MostWicked · 15/01/2014 10:41

It might be shill bidding, it might be a genuine mistake - who knows.

What matters, is are you willing to pay the maximum bid that you entered?
If you think it is a good price, then buy it, if you think you can get it cheaper elsewhere, don't buy it.

I would definitely report shill bidding if it was clear that's what it was, but by the sounds of it, it isn't clear at all.

plainjanine · 15/01/2014 12:21

You can't really prove for sureif it's shill bidding or not. I've been in the same position myself in the past, so I just reply to the 2nd chance offer saying that I don't like the way second chance works, so won't be taking it up. Wait for it to be relisted / another one comes along.

TeacupDrama · 15/01/2014 16:08

you can opt out of second chance offers completely go to your account and change your settings

MsLT · 15/01/2014 17:31

Tell them to list it again and you'll bid again.

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